


Orbit

by ficsiwontadmitto



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-11
Updated: 2015-09-11
Packaged: 2018-04-20 05:24:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,545
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4775273
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ficsiwontadmitto/pseuds/ficsiwontadmitto
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Trespasser Spoilers: Cullen and the Inquisitor never completed their romance, but they have been stuck circling each other for years. With the Anchor as it is, with Thedas as it is, something must yield.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Orbit

She feels small; the task before her, massive.

She must remind herself the world is not so very large. Thedas, if anything, has shrunk in the wake of her power. They are here now at the Winter Palace because empires quake at her will. Orlais, Ferelden, the Chantry, they think they will rise and fall at her whim. They are afraid.

Walking the gardens by herself, she is surrounded everywhere by diplomats. Four years ago, no one wanted a hard-headed girl from the Marches. Even now strangers cannot recognize her by face alone. Being Inquisitor is her defining identity, a shaky one at best. With her attire she may take the title off, put it back on. No one recognizes her without her vestments. All those trappings of power rendered in cloth and sigils.

They recognize Cullen, though. Josephine has been collecting offers of marriage for them both, but Cullen most of all. Men who pass Lady Trevelyan without a second look may well be on paper as desiring her with great, overwhelming passion. Such liars. But the ones who ask for Cullen, they are truly sincere.

No one passes up Cullen, with wheaten hair and warm liquor eyes. He'll always catch the setting sun. He, for what it is worth, has caught a mabari. 

"I'm not sure you understand how the game is played, Commander Rutherford."

"He has to learn to dodge the fireballs," Cullen scowls.

She kneels down by the hound, petting his belly when he rolls over, four feet in the air. Her dress pools around her feet. In the Marches, her family always kept dogs, sleek creatures for hunting rabbits. Not stocky ones like the south prefers.

"You will spoil him," Cullen warns.

She does not pull her hand away. Instead she scratches between his ears.

"Dogs want nothing more than your love. It is cruel to deny him."

Cullen grunts under his breath.

They have not been great friends, she and Cullen. The Inquisitor is sure she to blame. She had not failed to notice how he blushed and stammered upon their first meeting outside of battle. She had not missed how close he would walk at her side. The light in his eyes at the glancing of their hands against one another.

But those days are years gone. The months of unanswered expectation are fat between them. Bloated and ill.

She returns to her feet, bidding Cullen goodbye. Josie has some entertainment planned for tonight. He nods at her leave, "of course, Inquisitor."

\--

After a night of opera and wine, she falls to bed, warm. Lonely. She thinks of Cullen's lips on hers, then lower across her body. Against the plane of her stomach, down to her folds and core. She thinks of his hot, wet mouth against her sex, thick, calloused fingers slotted into her heat. More than think these things, she slicks her own slender fingers into her cunt. First one, then two, then three. Easy enough. She bucks her fingers deep inside herself, running her thumb against her clit. He would be longer, bigger. He would fuck the years of frustration into her. Yes, she thinks. They would break clear through this Orlesian catastrophe of a bed. They'd land on the floor, surrounded by splinters and fine cloth, and fuck through that too.

She comes, clenching around her own digits, breathing like she's run a race at full speed. It's no use. Their time will never come.

\--

The Anchor wrecks her. With every pulse it grows stronger. Every step through every eluvian brings her closer to certain death. She can feel it, the way this strange magic creeps its way through her blood. It is no longer merely in her hand, it tendrils up her neck, piercing behind her eyes.

She does not even know she is screaming.

Someone, she cannot see who, bundles her away. It is either Cullen or Cassandra. Leliana is not strong enough to carry her. Nor is Josephine. She turns her head to their chest and inhales. Cullen, then.

He places her on the floor, hard and cold as ever. Why even bother moving her away from the others? His hands are on the Anchor, wrapped around her wrist. He is holding his breath. It is hurting him.

Minutes drag on. Her vision returns. She can see the sweat at his brow, the strain in his arms to hold steady. 

"What are you doing?" She doesn't understand.

"I thought I could take away your pain." He smiles, weakly, "I suppose it was a silly idea."

It is, was, will always be. But the Anchor has calmed down to a dull roll of light. She realizes this is all for the best, that she and Cullen never made it any further than touching hands and solitary fantasy. That everything is always being cut off, just short of completion. Still, she wants to kiss away the bead of sweat that falls across his lips.

\--

"The discharge, it hurts others now. It will hurt you."

"I do not care," Cullen's voice is brutally honest. "I have never cared."

She sobs against his chest. They have wasted so many years in each other's orbit. Once she was young, and beautiful. In the way all maidens are, even rough ones from the Marches. She is still lovely, if no longer young. And when Cullen presses his lips to hers, she can think of things other than her hasty demise.

With soft sighs and sharp teeth she kisses back. She swallows down his moans of agony as the discharge creeps across their skin, lashing at their veins, clogging up their arteries. His pain is lost against the flesh of her neck, his hands pulling apart her dress. He pulls and pulls until the seams rip. He whispers that he will buy her another.

She does not remind him that she will not live long enough for that.

He sucks one nipple into his mouth, lavishing affection with his tongue until it is pebble hard. The scrape of his teeth make the softness more distinct. The other he works with his fingers, keeping her breast warm with delight.

The Anchor flares again. The wetness she feels now against her skin can be nothing but his tears.

"I will love you now, Maker, I will show you how much I have loved you."

He lifts her from the ground with ease, her feet swinging above the floor. Putting her to bed, she tries not to think of a grave. 

Tomorrow she will run again through the endless labyrinth of mirrors. She does not expect to find an exit.

Cullen strips with little grace. She would laugh at how he nearly trips out of his breeches. If this were another life, perhaps. One where they had kissed on the battlements of Skyhold with the mountain wind in their hair. One where he kissed her until her teeth hurt, making her promise to return after Corypaheus was slain. Instead she can only marvel at him as he is now, all hard surfaces and soft features. He stares. He stares at her and strokes his cock. 

She wishes time would stand still for this, for them. She wishes she could try again.

It is she who pulls him forward until he is atop her. She wraps her legs about his hips. His cock slides along her sex, teasing at her clit with each half-stroke. Between their bodies she grows wet. Scrambling for air, she finds his waiting mouth. He slides into her, all the way to the root with a single stroke. The fit is perfect.

She holds his face between her palms as he presses his hips into hers. Cullen speaks as many words of undying affection as he can conjure.

"I love you. I have always loved you. I will always love you."

She counts her blessings as he counts his.

"I love you. I have always loved you. I will always love you."

His smile is as bright as the sun. When the Anchor releases, it tints his tears green. When they fall, fat and heavy onto her chest, they fizzle like lightning. 

Their hips do not falter. They will see this to the end. She takes her nails across his back. Too late she recalls her own power.

He spills into her; her stomach tightens and releases. She twitches around his cock. But she cannot crash out. Her hand keeps her tied here, to her body and to this bed, even as it wills her to step through the Veil. The marks across his back are tinged with seafoam. When she watches the muscles move under his skin, she's afraid he's about to burst. Cullen whispers into her hair that he is fine. She should sleep. Impossible.

\--

She comes through the eluvian, missing a fraction of herself. Cullen is not there to greet her. She lays alone on the floor. The pain is gone, along with the arm. She is tired, so tired. Waiting is not an option. She sleeps.

When she wakes it is with Cullen at her side, asleep, with his arm about her waist. 

The sun creeps through the shades. On the chair hangs her replacement dress. She turns her head, smiling into the pillow.

**Author's Note:**

> Buh, I don't know.


End file.
